The Pentagon Papers, a US government report into the Vietnam War, were finally published in full, 40 years after embarrassing details of the document were leaked.

President Lyndon Johnson’s administration commissioned a Vietnam Study Task Force in 1967 to write a comprehensive report about America’s ill-fated involvement in the Vietnam conflict.

Excerpts were leaked to the New York Times in 1971, by former United States Military Analysist Daniel Ellsberg, showing that successive US administrations had lied to the public about Vietnam, and triggering then president Richard Nixon to attempt to prevent any further such leaks.

Although it is unclear if any new information is contained in the 47-volume report — much of it has already been published — Timothy Naftali, head of the Nixon library and museum, welcomed its declassification.